As most of you know, I’m a full time stay-at-home mom (maid, cook, nanny, chauffeur, doctor and dog walker) and a part-time blogger. I know that many of you, however, probably work outside of the home, and I can honestly tell you, I have a lot of days where I wish I did too. Being a stay at home isn’t all sticky tables, runny noses, laundry stains, dirty dishes and poopy diapers– it can be fun at times fun too and my moods often switch from bliss to stress in five to ten minute increments. I do love the fact that using cloth diapers means that no matter how many poopy diapers we have in one day, I just throw my Thirsties in the wash.

Yesterday I had Cooper at the gym where I often go to do a light workout and get some writing done. The daycare is great. He’s been going since he was six weeks old and he’s happy to get out of the house. I call it my office and it even has WiFi. I get two hours of daycare daily with our membership and it’s been my lifesaver. I always bring Cooper in his cloth diapers and I bring two extras. I change his diaper before we leave and toss the soiled one in the wet-bag and the extra back into the diaper bag.

Since I’m always there, the daycare ladies have become quite familiar with Cooper’s cloth diaper booty–but not because they’ve ever changed him–they’re not “allowed” to so if he, or any other baby poops, they go and find his or her mother or father in the gym—yes, even if you’re running at 6.0 on the treadmill or right in the middle of an oh-so-relaxing “Child’s pose” in a yoga class–and silently beckon with a crooked finger and an apologetic smile that says “I’m not a bit sorry that I don’t have to change your child’s poopy diaper for you.”

The last time I was there, one of the daycare workers, an elderly lady of whom I’m quite fond, commented on how “fancy” Cooper’s Thirsties were. She said that she had bought some cloth diapers for her grand-baby but that her daughter-in-law doesn’t use them because the baby goes to daycare while she’s at work and that they’re not allowed. This got me thinking–is cloth diapering done mainly by stay-at-home moms? I have a hard time believing that there aren’t lots and lots of cloth-diapering families that have both parents working outside of the home.

So tell me, if your child goes to a daycare, whether it’s in someone’s home or at a center, do you bring your cloth diapers and if so, is it more work for you or for the caregivers since they don’t have access to all of your accessories, not to mention your diaper pail?
Working moms, tell us how you do it!

Elizabeth is a stay-at-home mother of three children, ages eight, six and three years. She lives in Boulder, Colorado with her husband, children, a dog and two cats. In her (very limited) spare time she likes to garden, hike, read mysteries and write. She has written three books for children and is usually covered in paint splatters.
http://eamckenzie5.wix.com/thespunkybookworm

I work full time and her father works and attends school full time. Our daughter attends an in home daycare that my friend runs but she won’t do cloth diapers. My feeling is that a lot of daycares don’t want to use the cloth wipes and aren’t comfortable with cloth since they aren’t familiar with how awesome they are!

Comment by Katherine on September 17, 2012 at 2:33 pm

My daycare was a little surprised when I showed up with cloth and announced we had switched. I brought AIO’s in a wet-dry bag. I asked that she shake solid poop into trash or potty, but no need to rinse. I’d rinse and wash when I got home. The first day she announced that it was no big deal, and she was surprised at how easy. The only challenge for me was doing laundry every night since I didn’t have a lot of AIO, and remembering to take the bag back and forth.

Comment by Amy on September 17, 2012 at 2:35 pm

I hate to admit it, but the past few weeks we just haven’t had time to do the whole cloth thing. They’re clean but have ammonia built up and I want to do a strip but since we live in an apartment and don’t have a washer/dryer in our apartment we just haven’t had time. I usually use my parents’ washer on the weekends but the past few weekends have been jam packed. I hate to say that we aren’t cloth diapering but with our wonky work schedules, we’ve been throwing out the money for disposables. Right now she isn’t in daycare but will more than likely be going to a daycare after she turns 1 in November. Our area doesn’t know much about cd’ing so I don’t know what they’re going to say when we start using them again.

Comment by Corrie on September 17, 2012 at 2:36 pm

We only decided to use cloth when my son was 7 months old. After trialing several different times at home, I took them to our in home daycare provider and let her check them out. After she decided that she was OK with them (afterall, they did not have safety pin & plastic pants), we went ahead and purchased more diapers. She puts the dirty diapers in a wetbag and I rinse them out at home. Unfortunately, she is relocating so now it’ll be a criteria for our new daycare provider. Hopefully it goes well!

As for a wash routine, I bought about 3-4 days worth of diapers. This allows me to wash them through the night and dry them the next day without running out.

Comment by Crystal on September 17, 2012 at 2:42 pm

I will say that it really depends. I use a daycare one day a week. It’s not cloth diaper friendly. But when I brought the subject up, I got to whip out a BG 4.0 with aplix and the ladies there got to oooo and ahhhh over how cool it was. One was so impressed she even went to the owner of the daycare chain and explained about ‘new’ cloth diapers, but was still told a no. One day of sposies a week is not my hill to die on. BUT if i had to use a daycare more than one or two days a week, i would prob find a home daycare in this area because they are more willing to do CDing.

Comment by Mariah on September 17, 2012 at 2:43 pm

I send my LO to daycare in pockets with cloth wipes and a wet bag. It works just fine although we have had a few leaks or blow outs at daycare and we have only had 2 at home. I assume it is because they don’t choose the correct snaps or something, but they never complain about the clothes changes. He is 4 months and he goes to a daycare center.

Comment by Lindsey on September 17, 2012 at 2:44 pm

My son goes to daycare at somebody’s house. She uses our pocket diapers. I don’t notice any extra work because of it.

Comment by Martha on September 17, 2012 at 2:46 pm

We use thirsties AIO at daycare (and home). Never one hesitation with the daycare. They just wanted to know the details but then no problem! There is another little girl in cloth as well in his class. I have heard some daycares or providers actually charge more! What?! It works the same way a disposable does! They’re not asked to wash. We’re very fortunate to have a wonderful daycare that welcomed his cloth diapered butt!

Comment by Laura Czerwinski on September 17, 2012 at 2:49 pm

Our provider was hesitant at first. We go to an in-home daycare, so she makes the rules. When I promised her they’d be as easy as disposables, plus less trash in her garbage, she was intrigued. I brought in some with aplix and she was hooked. She shows them to everyone now.

Comment by Amanda on September 17, 2012 at 3:00 pm

I am very thankful to have a found a cloth-friendly day care. In fact, when we were first checking it out, I asked the woman who was giving me a tour if they would “allow” cloth diapers, and she got excited and said that she wished more people used cloth. I wasn’t expecting such an enthusiastic response! Needless to say, that was one of the things that sold me on that particularly facility.

We use prefolds and Thirsties covers at home, but daycare wouldn’t take cloth, so he’s in sposies when he’s there.

Comment by Athene on September 17, 2012 at 3:04 pm

I am so fortunate to have found a VERY cloth-friendly provider! When the little guy was breast feeding, she just tossed diapers into a wetbag throughout the day. For a while I even provided her with some detergent, and she’d wash every night! Now that he’s eating real food we just use a liner in his diapers so there’s little to no mess to deal with. We’ve used pockets exclusively, but our provider made it clear that she’d have no problem doing prefolds / covers if that’s what we wanted.

Comment by Jillian on September 17, 2012 at 3:06 pm

My daycare had no problem as long as they don’t have to do the rinsing. They just fold it up and put it in the wet bag for me to deal with when I get home. It does put a little extra wear on the diapers and I do need to strip more often, but it’s been working out. They told me its just putting it in a bag instead of trash so it’s not much different.
I use the planet wise wet/dry bag and bring it back and fourth everyday so I don’t need a separate school stash of dipes. I do keep like 3 or 4 disposables at school just incase they run out for emergency.

I read somewhere there is regulations about the storage of the dirties, it may differ state to state so maybe that’s why some schools don’t allow cloth.

Comment by Joey on September 17, 2012 at 3:09 pm

I am a stay at home mom as well, but I did work in daycare and the subject if cloth diapers never came up from any of my parents. I would have been more than happy to use them, but was never ask. I don’t even know the policy if that daycare on cloth diapers. I keep children in my home and would be happy to do this in my home.

Comment by Hallie Sampson on September 17, 2012 at 3:30 pm

We use cloth and my son goes to an in home daycare. My daycare lady doesn’t have a problem with them. I only send Velcro pockets, and when she changes him, she just puts the dirty one into a medium wetbag. We’re still dealing with ebf poo, but I’ll never ask her to deal with dumping anything.

Comment by Liesal Hoffman on September 17, 2012 at 3:33 pm

My husband is in the Army and at both the posts we’ve been assigned to (one stateside and one in Germany), the on post daycare requires you to provide a doctors note stating it is a medical necessity that your child has to wear cloth diapers. Even though we were able to get the note and have her in cloth stateside, there is such a big rotation of care providers that no one ever put her diaper on right and she always had leaks which was terribly frustrating and I felt so bad for her. They also required that the shell be changed with every diaper change which is frustrating because using covers and inserts doesn’t require changing the cover at every change. We’ve decided for me to be a stay at home mom here in Germany, so I’ve just avoided doing anything where I’d even have to take her there for an hour because I don’t trust people dealing with her cloth.

Comment by Jessica on September 17, 2012 at 3:43 pm

We will be embarking upon cloth at a daycare center come the beginning on January. We didn’t do cloth with our first (at a different place – we moved), but there is already one baby in cloth there, and these people don’t seem scared like the last people did. We will be using pockets with them, both snaps & aplix. We will simply be using a larger wetbag that can hang for the dirties. I’m currently undecided about using cloth wipes. I’ll probably need more wipes if we are going to do that.

Comment by Emily on September 17, 2012 at 4:18 pm

We’ve used cloth diapers for DD (now almost 3) and an 10 week DS since both started Daycare at about 7 weeks. The daycare we first started with was the same one a coworker of mine was at. She started cloth there before me. Since we’ve moved (2 times now) we are on a 3rd daycare and everyone has used cloth. But we’ve done some searching and have refused to go to a daycare that doesn’t accept them. Like everyone else, we use pockets and a wet bag. There are some occasional grumbles, but, so far, its been a pretty good experience.

Comment by Rachell on September 17, 2012 at 4:49 pm

Both of my daughters were in clothies at daycare. My elder daugher was at an in-home care situation from 5 months – potty training, and her provider willingly (with a little education) used prefolds and Thirsties covers. When my younger daughter was about 15 months old, we switched to center-based care. They too were willing to give clothies a shot. To make it easier for them, I did send fitteds.
Never in the four years of cloth diapering did I ever hear a complaint. I provided a week’s worth of diapers, three extra covers and two wet bags at the start of each week. I took the dirties home each evening, and returned the wet bags in the morning. Now, I do have a great daycare, but the staff was actually intrigued and requested more information. I even inspired a few to give cloth diapering a shot! All it takes is a little education and preparation!

Comment by Heather on September 17, 2012 at 4:52 pm

I’ve sent cloth diapers with my son to two different in home daycares and used them with a nanny, and never had any problems. I don’t have the sitter wash out the poo, I do it when we get home, and I send pocket or AIO diapers, so I don’t think it’s much more work than disposables, and no one has complained. We even converted the nanny to cloth, using prefolds and covers no less!

There is no state in the US that does not allow for day cares to cloth diaper, so there can be a hefty amount of education needed.

My favorite cloth diapers for daycare have always been those diapers that the inserts agitate out in the wash or AIOs. Thirsties will always be one of my top choices because of the convenience they give daycare providers!!

Comment by Anne Marie on September 17, 2012 at 5:04 pm

I work full-time but we only use a babysitter. I wouldn’t dream of sending my baby to a daycare who refused to cloth diaper. I’m so sorry, you don’t want my money? That’s fine, I’ll find someone who will cater to the “stress” a cloth diaper adds to your daycare life! 😛

Comment by Elizabeth S on September 17, 2012 at 5:26 pm

Our girls are at a Montessori school / daycare. With our oldest (now 2.5), they had no problem with cloth diapers as long as they were AIOs. Now, my youngest (7 months) is in the infant room and of the 6 babies there, 4 are cloth diapered, and the teachers are now pretty adept at using all types of cloth diapers (including prefolds + covers). None of the cd’ed babies use cloth wipes, but the teachers just separate the disposable wipes from the diapers and throw those out.

Comment by Sandra on September 17, 2012 at 5:58 pm

My husband & I both work fulltime outside the home. Our son goes to daycare 5 days a week at a center. They were really great when I talked to them about cloth. They had several other families try it before me & not stick with it (our son is 17 mos & has been in daycare since he was 4 mos, cloth the whole time).

We pack 8 pre-stuffed pockets with flushable liners each day. The workers toss the liner when they change his diaper just like they would a disposable diaper. That way there isn’t poop sitting around in my wetbag. I use a wetbag with a loop & they hang it on a hook just above the trash can where they throw away the sposies. I take the dirties home each day & bring clean diapers with liners back the next day. It’s been very easy! Our center has been wonderful about it.

Comment by Jill B. on September 17, 2012 at 7:39 pm

While we both work outside of the home, we have alternating schedules. I think we would have rethought cloth diapering had she needed to go to daycare. I have heard that around here they charge a fee for cloth diapering.

We use pocket diapers and cloth wipes and our daycare has no problem with it. They asked questions in the beginning, but the only other thing they said was how cute her diapers were! They just throw them in a wet bag hanging in her cubby.

Comment by Sarah on September 17, 2012 at 8:52 pm

We use cloth exclusively and my 9mo goes to day care 3-4 days a week. I send her with the duo dipe or the aio. I pre-stuff the duos or other pockets if our stash of clean dipes is low. I send her in a pre-fold and always pack on extra for when I pick her up. Our day care is not allowed to rise poopy dipers so they send everything home in the wet bag. I un-stuff, rinse and put in the pail at home at the end of hte day. We have a pretty good routine and they are great about accommodating our needs. I still send disposable wipes but, I am tempted to send the spray bottle and cloth wipes when these run out. Finding a day care that would use cloth was part of our search.

My daughter (almost one year old) is in daycare five days a week. We use an in-home daycare and our sitter was more than happy to use our cloth diapers. I just prestuff enough diapers for the day plus a few extra and send a large wetbag and she tosses them in there. If she has a poopy, I just spray it when I get home at night.

Comment by Leslie S. on September 18, 2012 at 10:40 am

I honestly dont get people that get so grossed out to cloth diapering plus what the fuss is about CDing. It’s just as easy as regular cloth diapering but with stuff that you don’t throw away or may snap. I use pockets and they are so easy a dad can even do it!lol

Comment by Angela Streit on September 18, 2012 at 12:15 pm

Luckily we have nanny who will do cloth diapers. It is harder with daycare for sure.

Comment by Jessie T-B on September 18, 2012 at 12:23 pm

I used sposies at day care, I just felt like it was easier for her as she had several other babies who needed changing too. I get overwhelmed with just 2, I can’t imagine how she felt with more! I never even asked at the time. I plan to look for one who does cloth next time if I need day care again though.

Comment by Heather on September 18, 2012 at 1:41 pm

I work for myself and finally had my dd start daycare once a week at 9 months old. I was lucky enough to bring her to work with me until then. Her daycare does NOT accept cloth diapers because it is against state regulations (Colorado). I think I was told because it is unsanitary? But what is the difference between putting a ‘sposie in the trash bag never-to-be-touched again by their hands verses putting my cloth into a wet bag never-to-be touched again by their hands? I just don’t get it.

For the time being my sister watches my LO at home and she’s willing to use our cloth diapers. In the near future, we anticipate baby girl to need to go a daycare center. I sure hope to find one that accepts our cloth diapers.

Comment by Lily Ivey on September 18, 2012 at 10:03 pm

We don’t go to daycare, but we go to our church nursery. And it depends on who is in there. My best friend use to keep it and she knew how to use our cloth diapers so I would bring my wraps and prefolds, but now I have been using disposables since she got married and left us! I just recently received an AIO and am thinking of sending him in his wrap and prefold, and then letting them change him into the AIO.

Comment by Lindsay on September 19, 2012 at 8:22 am

I am a stay at home mom and I babysit for a neighbor. She lucked out! We both do prefolds! The ladies in my church nursery are willing to change cloth diapers. Our church just added a new location that we are helping launch which has changed things a bit. The woman who ran the room at the original location cloth diapered her children and grandchild. She was perfectly fine with it. The woman who leads the new location will do it. However, she has some trouble with prefolds and snappis. I got some good deals on disposables so while things are little crazy with the new campus we are going that route. We’ll make sure to bring fitteds for her when we run out of disposables.

Comment by Jessi on September 19, 2012 at 6:01 pm

My kiddo is in cloth diapers and daycare is good about it. A brief learning curve for them, but now it’s no problem. I send 2 days worth at a time (4 changes/day) and do laundry every other day. I send cloth wipes too, and it’s no issue at all.

My home daycare provider was 100% on board from day one. We are so lucky! We send a wet bag and she uses disposable wipes. We send AIOs and pockets. She has even mastered snaps!

Comment by Cammie on September 20, 2012 at 2:21 pm

I think it’s great that some daycare providers are willing to use cloth. I have had both experiences when leaving our little ones.

Comment by Casey on September 20, 2012 at 2:22 pm

I haven’t seen many if any where I live that will cooperate with cloth diapering. It’s really silly.

Comment by Jay on September 20, 2012 at 3:45 pm

My son gets to wear his cloth at childcare, but they cannot dispose of the poop. They treat it like it was a disposable and put it in a sealed bag (a zippered wetbag) and let me dispose of stuff at the end of the day when I get home. That part sucks, but I’m thankful they’ll use it at all! I offered to purchase a sprayer, but they said they cannot. Even if it was a 100% solid, ploppable poop, they cannot drop it in the toilet since it could splash up and that is a sanitary issue.

We use cloth as much as possible. I’ve been trying to get better at cloth diapering on-the-go too. I do use disposables once in a while to change things up when my baby has diaper rash.

Comment by Dandi D on September 21, 2012 at 9:00 am

I just started a Bible study that has childcare provided and the one lady I spoke with was excited to see cloth diapers. She said hardly anyone uses them anymore. I brought AIOs and a small wet bag for them to use since it is easier than the prefolds/covers that we use most of the time. As long as they are ok with it, I’ll keep using cloth. Yippee!

Comment by Kayla on September 21, 2012 at 11:45 am

I’m expecting my first lo in Feb. So haven’t used cd yet. However my husband and I both work full time and we have found a daycare for the two days a week that we need that is considering cd. We go Monday. I’m going to take part of my stash and hope to convince them that they are just as easy as sposies.

Comment by Jennifer Noel on September 21, 2012 at 8:27 pm

When we first started CDing our dd, she was in daycare and they wouldn’t use them so she was in disposables during the weekdays. With our next one, I will either find a daycare that will or leave our baby with a family member.

Comment by Amanda Alvarado on September 22, 2012 at 8:32 am

We do use cloth diaper at our daycare! I kind of had to fight for it, they told me no at first and said they were against the law. I looked up the regulations for our state and emailed the owner to clarify the “law.” Since they receive funding from the state, they have to allow them so we were covered. I did a quick demo to the girls to show how easy they were and they were very accepting of it. I send around 6 per day and a wet bag. They place all dirties in the wet bag and I dump poo and drop dirties in the pail when I get home.

Comment by Felicia R on September 23, 2012 at 10:33 am

Our DD goes to an in-home day care- and the woman said she would give it a try to start and after 2 weeks commented how easy it is for her- we send either AIO or pre-stuffed pockets with flushable liners and she simply puts the dirty ones in a wet-dry bag and we send in a clean bunch every day. We use disposable wipes at day care just to make it easier and there have been no problems so far! So happy that we found someone who would give it a try to see how easy it is!

Comment by Wendy on September 23, 2012 at 12:29 pm

This is something that’s really weighing on my mind these days. I’m going back to work in January, and while my LO is on a wait list ofr a daycare centre (and they already said they’re ok with cloth), I’d really rather find an in-home daycare closer to my house. CD is probably going to be an issue – I know a few in-home providers who absolutely refuse – but it’s something I really feel strongly about so I’m going to keep looking. Fingers crossed

Comment by LeeAnne A on September 23, 2012 at 10:05 pm

So glad to read this post and all the comments. I’m expecting in oct and have found cloth to be a tough sell to some, especially when daycare is brought up. I’m happy to hear the two aren’t always mutually exclusive.

Comment by Katie on September 23, 2012 at 10:33 pm

I totally agree with you, that’s why I work outside the house. The daycare happily uses our Fuzzibunz (their preferred), Grovia or Thirsties for over a year now.

Comment by sus vandil on September 24, 2012 at 3:33 am

Willingness to use cloth diapers was a prerequisite for daycares for my twins. Luckily, our favorite one was also the only daycare open minded to using cloth diapers on the babies. I take eight CDs in wet/dry bags every morning.

I used CD on my daughter 100% of the time. But I had to buy disposables for when my hunny babysat. I was getting pretty annoyed having to spend money on a pack of diapers and whiles when I had made a huge investment on cloth diapers and wipes. So I decided to just refused to keep buying the disposables. And now he’s all over them. He picks the color diaper that matches her outfit of the day. Can’t say how happy I am now.

Comment by esteffani morales on September 26, 2012 at 9:02 am

cloth diapers at childcare is a huge concern of mine. I am glad to hear that a lot of people did not have problems with it.

Comment by courtney on September 26, 2012 at 2:23 pm

No problem at our home-based daycare. We mostly send Bumgenius Elementals, which they find easier than the prefolds and covers some other kids use. There have been a few “user errors” but nothing major. I never asked, but if the poop is solid they flush it for me. They love my Planetwise hanging wet/dry bag versus the flimsy drawstring bag another family sends!

Comment by Melissa on September 27, 2012 at 1:31 pm

My son is in undies now but he did cloth at 3 different center daycares over 1.5 years. (we moved and then didn’t like the first one agter move). State Rules don’t make it easy on daycares to use cloth. The first 2 just followed the rules I gave them. The most recently (a place that we LOVE) was newly opened and trying extra hard to meet all the state laws. It was very tough, one state rep would give a different answer than the first — sometime undermining what the first one said. There was a lot left to interpretation. Exactly what we had to bring changed almost daily to meet the requirements – I also had to get a doctors note!

In the end it was the dr’s note combined with a bag in a flip top pail (they provided the pail), and individually wrapped dirty diapers in small wet bags (or plastic bags — but I supplied the wet bags). Also nothing could be reused after soiled — annoying because we used gro via or covers and prefolds – all about reused so I had to buy a few more covers to get by. Luckily my son was 2 so not as many changes in a day. If/when I do it over I will probably buy daycare specific one-use diapers it was too stressful adapting my system and we only did it 3 days a week!

Comment by Sierra on September 27, 2012 at 2:46 pm

Cloth isn’t allowed at any daycares around here except the in-home places… but we figured that *any* cloth diapering we did was an improvement over full-time disposables!

Comment by Leah on September 28, 2012 at 2:06 pm

After having 8 kids, I have finally found cloth diapers. I am so excited to use the new all in one cloth. After searching many companies, I almost went with gdiapers because they were readily available at stores. But luckily I found Thirsties, which are made in the next town over from where I live! I love that they are local and made in the USA, plus they are much more affordable than other cloth diapers! Hopefully I will stick with it and not give up!

Comment by Theresa Ciardella on October 3, 2012 at 6:07 pm

While looking for a daycare, many told me cd weren’t allowed although I found there are no restrictions in my state. It can be tough.

Comment by jay on October 6, 2012 at 10:23 pm

We use cloth diaper with our daycare provider. It was the first question I asked when I was touring different ones. All of them said they would give it a try. We use gDiapers during the day and thirsties covers and prefolds at night. Once I showed them how to use them they had no problem. I leave a spare wetbag there. (In case I forget it one day) Then I have 2 more that I rotate between. Also one day when I forgot the wet bag they still used the cloth diapers and not my spare disposables. They just used a large plastic bag as a wet bag. It was so nice! When I get home I have to pull them out and take them apart but it’s not so bad.

Comment by Elizabeth Baxter on October 10, 2012 at 12:46 pm

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